Sponges lack nervous systems. Just as well. Broadway — where the hooks can come out — is no Bikini Bottom when it comes to hosting an optimistic porifera best known as a kids cable television brand, an animated star now bobbing dangerously close to irrelevance in cultural waters that flo...

Under a highly unusual veil of secrecy, apparently imposed by a contractual arrangement with Amazon Studios, Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre quietly allowed the director Spike Lee to film its production of Antoinette Nwandu's play "Pass Over" in September.

When I last saw Sarah Bockel, she was performing on Belmont Avenue in Chicago in “Parade,” a production of the BoHo Theatre Ensemble. If you live in Highland Park, you might have seen her in “The Pajama Game,” a production of the sadly defunct Music Theatre Company. Or maybe...